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Any remarks on SD DVD performance with these devices? I'm looking to recommend a BD player to colleagues, and some will not care a whit about DTS-HD MA or NetFlix, but will care about boot-up and load times and SD DVD PQ.

shinksma

I'll be watching a few DVDs this weekend so I will compare it to my S550.

However I did find the HD symbol on my queue on my BD-370, so now I can figure it out. I am still left wondering why I can't see this information on Netflix's site so that I know in the first place if I want to add it to my queue.

Thanks.

Have you connected your LG BD370 yet and activated Netflix using the code? If not, you won' get an HD option under the main menu for Watch Instantly.

why limit it to non enthusist? i'm an a enthusiast and looking forward to the this player or 390 at a reasonable price.

Second anyone know if the 390 will have front and back USB connections?

I'm not limiting it to non-enthusiast, I'm just recognizing the needs and wants of the non-enthusiast friends I have will differ from the the complete AV nuts that other friends and I are.

For the enthusiast, the questions become more complex: do they have an HDMI receiver or pre/pro? Do they have the capability to decode DTS-HD MA and TrueHD in the receiver, or must it happen in the player? Do they have a second transport for SD DVD, or a processor like a DVDO Edge, or a really good upscaler in their receiver/TV? How many other devices do they have that they want to replace with a BD player? These make selecting a good player a very personal experience.

The Oppo 83 is perfect for me, less perfect for others who may not be interested in SACD and DVD-A, and there is no way I could justify a $500 or $600 price-tag to non-enthusiast friends.

Whereas I know that I can make some generalizations about my non-enthusiast friends: as long as the BD player plays BDs well, has pretty good SD DVD upscaling, has optical/coax out for audio, is fairly fast to boot-up and load, and costs "about $250 or less" then they will be happy. I don't think any of them care for Netflix/YouTube streaming, multi-channel analog outs, and bitstreaming or internal decoding of DTS-HD MA or TrueHD.

Anyway, not putting down the LGs, just indicating that they seem to offer the basic needs at the price-points that will be appealing to some folks that don't need every bell and whistle.

shinksma

My opinions are my own, and do not necessarily reflect those of my captors.

Does the 370 automatically output 1080i BD content as 1080i while outputting 1080p content as 1080p? This is fairly important to me, because I use an external video processor and don't wish to manually select the player's video output when such content is played.

I picked up a LG BD370 the other day from Best Buy and could not for the life of me figure out why it could not establish a reliable internet connection. It would receive an IP from the DHCP server on my router, but whenever I attempted to use anything that accessed the internet (YouTube,Netflix), I would receive various connection-related errors. Thinking that the first player that I had was defective, I even returned it to the store and exchanged it.

Once the second player immediately began exhibiting the same issue, I knew that it had to be something with my network setup. Keeping in mind that everything else on my network was functioning fine, I tracked the problem down to my very recently installed D-Link DIR-825 router. Luckily I still had my old router on-hand. I was able to reinstall it and the BD370 began working perfectly.

I even tried resetting the D-Link router to default factory settings and ensuring that it was on the latest firmware. No matter what I tried I could not get the BD370 to work with the router. Since I had only had the router a few days, it went back to the store and I'm still using my old router for now.

However I did find the HD symbol on my queue on my BD-370, so now I can figure it out. I am still left wondering why I can't see this information on Netflix's site so that I know in the first place if I want to add it to my queue.

Thanks.

You may want to give Netflix's tech support a call. They have been very helpful to me in the past.

You may want to give Netflix's tech support a call. They have been very helpful to me in the past.

-e.B

I guess I will. I can not find a single way on their site to identify a streaming movie as HD. They should tag each one with an HD symbol, can''t be that difficult. Apparently in the past there was a page for HD Watch Instantly movies, because I found a link to it. However that link no longer works.

I found someone listing a few HD movies and added those to my instant queue last night. One was "The Host" and I watched some of it. The quality was definitely there! No 5.1 which is a disappointment but even at 120" I thought the picture was great! I would describe it as much better than DVD but quite a bit inferior to Blu-ray, as would be expected.

As an avid HD DVD user (A1 and A35), I've been patiently waiting for a standalone Blu Ray player that will meet and exceed the specifications of my HD DVD players. I believe the LG-BD390 to be that player. Profile 2.0, wi-fi enabled, 7.1 analog, and assuming the trend continues with LG's 300 series it will be one of the fastest loading BD players on the market. It seems like the perfect starting point for me to finally jump into Blu Ray.

So the player is definitely awesome, however it turns out the only improvements for me over my PS3 are Netflix streaming, zoom, and Youtube. Is that worth replacing the PS3 with the BD370? I'm not sure. Add the sizling noises to that and I am left quite torn. This is clearly a fantastic machine, but I sit here staring at the PS3 and the BD370 and the winner is not clear.

You have Netflix streaming on the PS3 by using Playon, and you have searchable Youtube videos on the PS3 by using the browser.

I guess I will. I can not find a single way on their site to identify a streaming movie as HD. They should tag each one with an HD symbol, can''t be that difficult. Apparently in the past there was a page for HD Watch Instantly movies, because I found a link to it. However that link no longer works.

The Netflix functionality sold me on this machine. I considered Roku but I needed a good DVD/Blu-Ray player was well, so this was a good way to get it all in one box.

Quote:

Originally Posted by shinksma

Any remarks on SD DVD performance with these devices? I'm looking to recommend a BD player to colleagues, and some will not care a whit about DTS-HD MA or NetFlix, but will care about boot-up and load times and SD DVD PQ.

My BD370 from power off to playing a DVD that's already in the drive is about 25 seconds with the current firmware. Boot to main menu when it's empty is only a couple of seconds faster. Spinning up a newly inserted DVD when the unit is on, after the tray has closed is about 7-8 seconds. Skipping chapters on a DVD feels a little slow (slower than my old old Pioneer DV-440). Fast-forward/rewind/play transitions aren't too bad but aren't lightning fast either.

One slight annoyance that maybe only affects a huge 0.01% of the population like myself is that the MAC address of the device isn't listed anywhere. There's no sticker on the player listing it and the player menus don't show it either. Entering a static IP was easy once I figured out how to slide down the cover over the numbers on the remote control.

The remote feels and looks like it was made by the same people who made the remote for the Zenith DTT901 DTV box, with the exemption of the "leather" texture.

I'm not limiting it to non-enthusiast, I'm just recognizing the needs and wants of the non-enthusiast friends I have will differ from the the complete AV nuts that other friends and I are.

For the enthusiast, the questions become more complex: do they have an HDMI receiver or pre/pro? Do they have the capability to decode DTS-HD MA and TrueHD in the receiver, or must it happen in the player? Do they have a second transport for SD DVD, or a processor like a DVDO Edge, or a really good upscaler in their receiver/TV? How many other devices do they have that they want to replace with a BD player? These make selecting a good player a very personal experience.

The Oppo 83 is perfect for me, less perfect for others who may not be interested in SACD and DVD-A, and there is no way I could justify a $500 or $600 price-tag to non-enthusiast friends.

Whereas I know that I can make some generalizations about my non-enthusiast friends: as long as the BD player plays BDs well, has pretty good SD DVD upscaling, has optical/coax out for audio, is fairly fast to boot-up and load, and costs "about $250 or less" then they will be happy. I don't think any of them care for Netflix/YouTube streaming, multi-channel analog outs, and bitstreaming or internal decoding of DTS-HD MA or TrueHD.

Anyway, not putting down the LGs, just indicating that they seem to offer the basic needs at the price-points that will be appealing to some folks that don't need every bell and whistle.

shinksma

well said shinksma,

i think this player is a value quality player as it includes netflix. Others like myself didn't want another game system (PSP) and neeed something to justify the upgrade to blueray. So your initial statements surprised me.